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Putin's War, Week 18. Snake Island, Prisoner Exchanges, Calculated Terror, and the War in Donbas

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Welcome back.

Let’s do a roundup of what the situation looks like 128 days into Vladimir Putin’s 72-hour Special Military Operation against Ukraine.

Strategic Level

Major takeaways from the NATO Summit.

NATO member states have agreed to begin providing Ukraine with offensive weapons. This is a huge departure from the status quo. When NATO agreed to send HIMARS and MLRS to Ukraine, they also agreed to equip them with rockets that couldn’t directly threaten Russian population centers. My guess is that the physical manifestation will be several hundred German Leopard 2A4 tanks currently in storage. They are obsolescent by the standard of the Abrams, Leopard 2A7, and Challenger 2, but they will be competitive with the Russian tanks that crossed the frontier in February and superior to the T-62s beginning to appear as replacement tanks in Russian units. We can surmise that transferring to Ukraine the upgraded MiG and Sukhoi fighters that gave everyone the vapors back in March-April is not far behind.

NATO/EU is working to establish transit routes for Ukrainian grain via Poland to avoid Russia’s blockade in the Black Sea. This will not be a quick process, but, like Western Europe seeking out new oil and gas supplies, it could be permanent.

The big news, of course, is that Sweden and Finland will join NATO–there is a rumor that Bulgarian might object because it gets 70+% of its natural gas from Russia. That would be a high-risk move for the Bulgarian government should it decide to do so.

Joe Biden, the UK’s Johnson, France’s Macron, and Germany’s Scholz have all said: 1) the war is going to be long, 2)  it is vital that Russia not gain territory from the war, and 3) they will do what it takes to ensure Ukraine retains he capability to liberate its territory from the invading Russians. Talk is one thing; convincing economically challenged voters is something entirely different.

Talk of forcing Ukraine to accept a disadvantageous peace agreement is now the exclusive province of folks who, for whatever reason, have decided that Russia is the aggrieved party that must be mollified.

Both rhetoric and actions indicate the perception that Russia is struggling and can be beaten.

Notably, the Russian government–this does not include members of the Russian Duma/Federal Assembly who can say stuff at least as exotic as anything Maxine Waters can come up with–has dialed back threats of nuclear Armageddon. Putin has threatened to give Belarus nuclear-capable missiles (just a note, these would be a weapon type that Russia agreed to give up when the INF treaty was signed). Belarus President Lukashenko has asked Russia for nuclear weapons. This needs to be monitored, but it doesn’t seem all that probable. I’m sure that Putin and Lukashenko would not like Poland to get nuclear-capable missiles.

Operational Level

It’s always good to remind ourselves of the situation on the ground. This is the video of the first 90 days of the war.

Despite a lot of breathless reporting, that situation is largely unchanged. This map, courtesy of the Institute for the Study of War, shows the front line remains static. There are changes; we’ll hit the Russian operation in Donbas in a moment, but not significant changes.

New weapons in action

The US authorized the transfer of truck-based Harpoon missiles to Ukraine. They have been credited with sinking the sea-going tug Vasily Bekh.

HIMARS makes its debut.

Ukraine is getting a major infusion of top-of-the-line NATO tube artillery along with rocket artillery. The German Panzerhaubitze 2000, French CAESAR, US M-109 and M777, and the Polish Krab are only some of the systems being deployed. Maintenance of a polyglot grouping of weapons can be a challenge for anyone. I suspect that higher echelon maintenance is being performed by foreign civilian contractors hired via the billions of dollars flooding into the war.

Several hundred Ukrainians have been trained to use the new artillery in Germany and the UK; more are being taught.

First prisoners from Mariupol have been exchanged.

When the city of Mariupol fell in May, some 1,700 Ukrainian soldiers passed into Russian custody. Most of those were members of the Azov battalion that the Russians and their fellow travelers derided as “Nazis.” The negotiated surrender agreement said they would be exchanged. The first of these are now back in Ukraine.

Terror is now a weapon.

A week ago, a shopping mall in Kremenchuk by a Russian cruise missile. The fact that it was a cruise missile suggests that the mall was the intended target.

This is not a one-off. Several times each week, civilian targets, remote from the front and from military facilities, are hit by Russian missiles. It seems pretty clear that terror has become one of Russia’s standard tactics.

Russian generals continue to be fired.

The turmoil continues in the Russian chain of command in Ukraine.

It is hard to determine what is going on without knowing the context. Is this a “give me results, now!” situation? Or are the patently incompetent and politically connected generals being weeded out? Is this the German Army in 1945? Or the American Army after Kasserine? I have my opinion, but it is just that.

Thrown into this mix is the arrival of HIMARS is giving the Ukrainians the ability to target headquarters out of range of tube artillery and the high mortality rate of senior Russian officers because of the peculiarities of that army’s organization.

Ukrainian prisoners sentenced to death by a Donetsk court.

Ukraine has as many as 30,000 foreign volunteers in the ranks of its Territorial Defence Forces, a branch of the Ukrainian military. They have all taken an oath and met the requirements of the UN Convention on the use of mercenaries. These fighters are some of the most skilled in the Ukrainian Army. Two Britons and a Moroccan were captured. Russia has no death penalty, so they were turned over to a Donetsk “Republic” kangaroo court.

Two Americans have been captured, and the same fate probably awaits them.

Snake Island

The arrival of modern artillery and Harpoon anti-ship missiles has made Snake Island untenable. Today, the Russians announced they had abandoned the island as a “goodwill gesture” to open a shipping lane for Ukrainian grain. Why Snake Island would have to be abandoned to accomplish this–not shooting at civilian ships would achieve the same purpose–is anyone’s guess.

As I pointed out in an earlier post on the subject, anti-ship missiles on Snake Island, assuming they are deployed in tandem with credible air defense systems, puts Ukraine’s remaining Black Sea frontage, particularly Odesa and the Danube estuary, off-limits to the Russian navy.

Kherson

There has been significant activity on the southern front. As the maps show, the Ukrainian Army is making small and steady gains. Again the map is courtesy of the Institute for the Study of War.


The Ukrainians are now less than 6 miles from Kherson City. Inside Kherson City, assassinations of collaborators and killings of off-duty Russian soldiers have become common. I doubt Ukraine will attempt to assault the city because that is a manpower-intensive and high-casualty operation. Instead, I would look for a Ukrainian offensive somewhere to the north aimed at the line of communication between Kherson and  Melitopol. The obvious objective is Nove Kharkova which sits astride that line of communication and controls the aqueduct that supplies Crimea with most of its potable water.

Kharkiv

Kharkiv is basically static. Both sides make small gains, but none seem to be sustainable. Ukraine’s primary objective here is to push Russian artillery out of range of Kharkiv and to bleed off forces that could be used in Donetsk to defend this area in an economy of force operation.


My prediction is that this will remain a backwater.

Donetsk

This theater of operations has gotten the most coverage because it is the only one where the Russians are having some success. The media needs a horserace narrative for their stories. The Putin fans want to point to it as a sign of Russia’s inevitable victory. So let’s look at how the front lines have changed in Donetsk over the last 60 days. The animation is courtesy of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute.

After some high-profile disasters, the Russians seem to have moved to dismounted operations supported by massive artillery strikes. The Ukrainians have fought a dogged defense, but they are trading terrain for force preservation. Australian General Mick Ryan’s take is, I think, the correct one.

There is no doubt casualties have been high on both sides. The Ukrainians do not seem to have the combat power to stop the Russian advance, and the Russians don’t have the logistics system to support a rapid offensive or the troops to execute it. This is not an existential battle for either side…unless one side or the other breaks. Is the Russian advance Rommel’s panzers in France in 1940? Or is it the Battle of the Bulge?

Prognosis

This war is at a stalemate for the moment. I haven’t written about the war because I haven’t seen much change in the underlying dynamics. Making predictions based on daily combat operations is like political analysts who make new predictions based on each poll.

The real struggle goes on out of sight. The Ukrainians declared conscription in March. Under a compressed training schedule, those units formed early should be making their appearance soon. The Russians are also having manpower issues. The daily bulletin by the UK Defence Ministry says that desertions and combat refusals, but they seem to be based on intercepted phone calls. Allegedly, Russian veterans are being offered three-month contracts to fight in Ukraine. At this point, I’m skeptical.

To me, the critical factor is that more modern varieties are replacing Ukrainian equipment. The Russians are digging into war stocks. In a long war, this will be decisive.

I see no evidence that Ukraine is in danger of political, moral, or military collapse.

However, I see evidence that Russia is looking for an exit. I believe that Russia is focusing on Donetsk because it wants to occupy the geographical boundaries of Luhansk and Donetsk and call for a cease-fire to attempt to lock in their gains. If Ukraine wants to continue the war, that could possibly cause some political difficulties inside NATO/EU.

My best guess is that we’ll see more of this until about August, and then the new round will open with different armies than started the war.

Finland and Sweden Prepare to Join NATO as Turkey's Erdogan Withdraws His Veto

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Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has removed his objections to the applications for NATO membership submitted by Sweden and Finland, guaranteeing those two previously unaligned nations will join the West’s bulwark alliance against Russian aggression.

In May, Sweden and Finland announced they would ask to become members of the NATO military alliance. This was an unprecedented step that even the threat of the USSR had not been able to accomplish (Finland Announces It Will Join NATO, Sweden to Follow, While Moscow Makes Its Usual Threats). Vladimir Putin’s February 2022 invasion of Ukraine did accomplish what Joe Stalin couldn’t in no small part because Putin began making noises about reestablishing the boundaries of the Romanov’s Imperial Russia (Did a Quickly Deleted Essay in Russian Media Explain What Vladimir Putin Wants Russia to Gain From the Ukraine Invasion? and Putin’s Threats to Sweden and Finland Are Much More Real Than They Are Being Given Credit For).

Just as things seemed settled–even Putin’s closest friend in NATO, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, approved of the new members (Hungary’s Viktor Orban Clears the Way for Finland to Join NATO in a Matter of Months)–Erdogan threw in a stink bomb.

Erdogan has voiced opposition to Finland and Sweden joining NATO in the past week, saying their support for the Kurds raises questions about adding the two countries as NATO members. A senior Turkish official told Bloomberg Friday that Turkey wants Finland and Sweden to take a clear stance against Kurdish militants fighting in southeast Turkey, and that Turkey will hold negotiations over their membership. Erdogan’s spokesperson Ibrahim Kalin clarified Saturday that Turkey isn’t attempting to block Finland and Sweden’s bids entirely, but wants to ensure that the national security of all NATO members is taken into consideration.

As talks developed, it became apparent that Erdogan wanted three things. First, he wanted an arms embargo Sweden and Finland had imposed on Turkey over its ongoing war with various Kurdish groups lifted. He wanted Sweden to cut all ties with the Kurdish PKK faction. Finally, he wanted Sweden and Finland to extradite Kurdish militants as well as members of the Gülen Movement, whom Erdogan blames for a 2016 coup attempt.

Turkey is a member of NATO for precisely one reason: it controls the Bosporus and Dardanelles. During the Cold War, that key piece of geography bottled up the Soviet Black Sea Fleet and secured the Eastern Mediterranean. It is an economic basket case with no cultural, linguistic, political, or religious points of commonality to the West. Since the demise of the USSR, Turkey’s actions could frequently be mistaken for those of a Russian ally in the correct lighting. It cooperated with the Russians in the war in Syria. Its military links to Russia became so troubling that it was booted from the lucrative F-35 grift. Turkey has nearly gone to war with Greece several times over Cyprus and Greece’s exclusive economic zone n the Aegean and the Eastern Mediterranean. In my personal opinion, Turkey’s possession of “The Straits” is less important than its political instability and inability to cooperate with NATO on major issues. Were it up to me; I’d give them their severance papers and let them deal with Iran as best they can.

The day before the NATO Summit in Madrid, Turkey said it was fine with Sweden and Finland joining the club.

“As NATO allies, Finland and Sweden commit to fully support Turkey against threats to its national security,” NATO’s Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said, providing some details of the agreement. “This includes further amending their domestic legislation, cracking down on P.K.K. activities and entering into an agreement with Turkey on extradition,” he added, referring to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party which seeks an independent Kurdish state on territory partly within Turkey’s borders.

Mr. Erdogan had been blocking the Nordic countries’ NATO bids amid concerns over Sweden’s longtime support for the P.K.K. which has attacked nonmilitary targets and killed civilians in Turkey, is outlawed in that country and is designated by both the United States and the European Union as a terrorist organization.

But the memorandum does not specify the extradition of any of the 45 people or so Mr. Erdogan wanted sent to Turkey to face trial on terrorism charges. Sweden has already passed tougher legislation against terrorism that goes into effect July 1.

This move creates a permanent change in European security arrangements. Sweden and Finland bring two highly regarded and well-equipped armies into NATO. Moreover, both nations are on track to reach the NATO target of spending 2% of GDP on defense by 2023, something most NATO nations fail to do.

Turkey’s acquiescence to a move that definitely hurts Putin’s expansion goals in the Arctic and goes a long way toward making Russia’s Northern and Baltic Fleets impotent and confined to port in case of a crisis with NATO. It means that Erdogan has decided that, for the time being, it is to Turkey’s advantage to cast his lot with NATO and not with his former BFF Vladimir Putin.

REVEALED: Joe Biden Funded Hunter Biden's Involvement in Russian Escort Ring

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The news surrounding Hunter Biden continues to get worse, with the president himself once again being implicated in one of his son’s devious schemes. We recently learned how much Hunter Biden was involved in his father’s political activities, but this latest revelation takes things to another level.

According to The Daily Caller, financial records and video prove that Joe Biden helped finance Hunter Biden’s involvement with a Russian escort ring. The amount of money involved is staggering, with the president sending his son $100,000 during the time period he paid $30,000 in bills for escorts.

President Joe Biden apparently unwittingly financed his son’s participation in an escort ring tied to Russia, records from a copy of Hunter Biden’s abandoned laptop show.

Hunter Biden spent over $30,000 on escorts, many of whom were linked to “.ru” Russian email addresses and worked with an “exclusive model agency” called UberGFE during a 3 1/2 month period between November 2018 and March 2019.

He managed to do so thanks in part to Joe Biden committing to wiring him a total of $100,000 to help pay his bills from December 2018 through January 2019.

In one instance, Joe Biden wired his son $5,000 while he was actively engaged with an UberGFE escort. In another, texts indicated Hunter Biden convinced his father to wire him $20,000 to finance his stay at a New York City drug rehabilitation program that he never checked into.

Keep in mind that Hunter Biden has a history of dealing with and taking money from Russian oligarchs, something RedState recently reported on, but I’m sure it’s just a coincidence that he was also dealing with Russian escort services along the way. It’s almost as if the entire “Russian collusion” thing was just a cover to protect Democrats, but I digress.

I understand the Caller has to maintain balance in their report, but I’m here to give my opinion, and I’m of the opinion that the word “unwittingly” is doing way too much work here. How many of you reading this would wire your son $100,000 over two months’ time without finding out exactly what it went to? Further, how many of you would send such a huge amount to a known drug addict and sexual deviant?

At the very least, this cements the Bidens as some of the worst parents in history. There’s a difference between helping a child and enabling them, and what Joe and Jill Biden have done and continue to do is enable the destruction of their son. At some point, you say enough is enough. You don’t keep wiring more money than most make in a year to keep the coked-up prostitute parties flowing.

I’d also say that even if we assume the Bidens are just this naive and stupid, that would seem rather disqualifying in regards to holding the presidency, wouldn’t it? The most powerful nation on earth is being led by a man who funded his son’s prostitution addiction, and the excuse is that he was just too aloof to know.

I mean, come on. If we were talking about a Republican family here, the calls for resignation would be deafening. After all, if you can’t handle your own family, how can you handle any public office, much less being the President of the United States?

US Should Be Cautious as Russia Raises Tensions Over Lithuania

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The European checkerboard grew increasingly complex over the weekend as economic sanctions over Ukraine continue to progress from talk to physical.  The latest round of EU sanctions bans the shipping of products such as coal, metals, construction materials, and advanced technology between EU territories and mainland Russia.

The Russian city Kaliningrad, the headquarters of the Russian Baltic Fleet and home to around 500,000 people is a pocket territory of Russia taken by the Soviet Union at the end of World War Two. After the end of the Cold War, Kaliningrad became isolated from the rest of Russia, an island with the Baltic Sea on one side and the now NATO countries of Poland and Lithuania between the territory and mainland Russia.

Kaliningrad’s position is similar to that of Crimea, the headquarters of the Russian Black Sea fleet, which was also geographically isolated from mainland Russia by Ukraine until it was annexed by the Vladimir Putin’s Russian Federation with operations beginning in February 2014 and a treaty signed by the 18th of March.

For many years, the flow of goods between mainland Russia and Kaliningrad was via rail lines passing through the former Soviet republic of Lithuania, now independent and a member of the EU and NATO.

And so is created this latest crisis.

The sanctions declared by the West stemming from the Russian invasion of Ukraine are beginning to move from the preparations phase to the implementation phase where goods and services would begin to be physically restricted.

Beginning in June 2022, Lithuania started imposing the sanctions regime on goods shipped by rail through their territory to and from Russia, which in this case is from mainland Russia to isolated province Kaliningrad. Lithuania has stated that it is only restricting items that are on the EU’s sanction list per the timeline of restrictions implementation; the transport of people and all other non-sanctioned goods remain free to move.

According to EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell, Vilnius is complying with the sixth round of sanctions imposed by the European Union. Borrell is quoted as saying, “Lithuania has not taken any unilateral national restrictions and only applies the European Union sanctions.”

This seems to have caught the Russians unprepared. Kaliningrad Governor Anton Alikhanov has noted that Russia had begun operating two ferries between Kaliningrad and St. Petersburg to handle the restricted traffic but would not have an additional seven ferries in operation to compensate for Lithuania’s rail restrictions until later this year.

Moscow is said to be summoning diplomatic representatives from both Lithuania and the European Union to discuss the matter.

But Moscow is also saber-rattling. On Monday, the Russian foreign ministry stated that: “If in the near future cargo transit between the Kaliningrad region and the rest of the territory of the Russian Federation through Lithuania is not restored in full, then Russia reserves the right to take actions to protect its national interests.”

Moscow has said this before. It said so in 2014 when it annexed the Russian Navy base in Crimea, an act that ultimately led to the war in Ukraine.

The trouble with this naval base on the Baltic Sea is that taking and holding territory to “protect its national interests” goes through land that triggers NATO’s Article 5 mutual defense pact, even if Lithuania, like Ukraine, is a former Soviet republic.

My RedState colleague Streiff also published a piece on this development this morning: Lithuania Enforces EU Sanctions on Kaliningrad and Putin’s Toadies Lose Their Minds – RedState

I’m a bit more focused on how Lithuania is a potential matchstick. The stakes for tension escalating to igniting a major war from what is beginning to happen in Lithuania are more serious for world peace than what is happening in Ukraine.

Ukraine is still technically a non-aligned country. It is not yet a member of either the European Union or the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, which means all sides can roughhouse in it and, quite literally, get away with murder.

The fact of the matter is that, despite all the media coverage of the bravery of Ukraine in its fight against Russia, the advantage of the war has shifted in favor of the Russians. The world fought the battle of the Fulda Gap earlier this year and the NATO defense strategy to stop a mobile tank army in its tracks using man-portable anti-tank missiles worked perfectly.  The Western militaries celebrated vindication of their investment in defense that began with the invention of the US TOW missile first used in Vietnam.

But that phase of the war has ended.  It has transitioned to the defense of Ukrainian cities against something the Russian army is particularly good at — the meat grinding siege craft of rolling artillery barrages. The Ukrainians are slowly but surely buckling. The Russians have also learned the lesson from their own logistic blunders of the importance of interdiction of the supply lines between the West and the Ukrainian Army. Sadly, things will play out with many Ukrainian lives lost until a peace treaty, urged by the West, forcing the Zelensky government to accept, eventually ends the active conflict.

Picking up the pieces of the mess in Ukraine will then begin. Repairing the damage done to the European economic landscape will take decades. The animus between West and East will perpetuate tensions and threaten political stability on both sides of the Ukrainian hole in the ground.

The key question is: Will it end before other flashpoints on the European checkerboard explode? The US and the EU, and indeed the Russians as well, need to navigate sanctions-induced tension with care. Lithuania instantly triggers calamitous treaties if something goes wrong.  As the remainder of this year plays out, I would rate it as a dangerous flashpoint on the same order as Sarajevo was to trigger World War One. Other fractures are likely to emerge both in the West and in Russia.

This begins to shift the focus of the narrative from keeping the Ukrainians viable to keeping Europe and America alive. How quickly the mainstream media figures it out and starts to ask hard questions, I don’t know.

Lithuania Enforces EU Sanctions on Kaliningrad and Putin's Toadies Lose Their Minds

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A long-expected flashpoint in Putin’s War just got a lot flashier. The Russian oblast of Kaliningrad is the home port, and only warm water port, of Russia’s Baltic Fleet. Until 1945, it was German territory with its capital in Koenigsberg. The territory was given to the USSR at the end of World War II despite the USSR having no valid historical claim to the territory. Koenigsberg became Kaliningrad, German residents were ethnically cleansed by the USSR, and Russian colonists settled.

Even though Kaliningrad can only be reached by land from Russia by transiting either Poland or Lithuania (70% of all traffic from Russia to Kaliningrad is via train), until Monday, Russia had been allowed to ship EU-sanctioned goods in and out of Kaliningrad by rail. That has changed. The Russians aren’t happy.

Russian authorities on Monday threatened Lithuania, a member of NATO, with retaliation if the Baltic country does not swiftly reverse its ban on the transportation of some goods to Russia’s exclave of Kaliningrad by rail.

Citing instructions from the European Union, Lithuania’s railway on Friday said it was halting the movement of goods from Russia that have been sanctioned by the European bloc.

Dmitri S. Peskov, the Kremlin’s spokesman, told reporters the situation was “more than serious.” He called the new restrictions “an element of a blockade” of the region and a “violation of everything.”

Accustomed to Russian threats, officials in Vilnius, the Lithuanian capital, took Moscow’s warnings as mostly bluster — the latest in a series of increasingly intemperate statements by a country that is severely stretched militarily by its invasion of Ukraine.

“We are not particularly worried about Russian threats,” said Lauynas Kasciunas, chairman of the Lithuanian Parliament’s national security and defense committee. “The Kremlin has very few options for how to retaliate.”

Two things to keep in mind. Pro-Putin sites like ZeroHedge are portraying the action as a “blockade” and claiming it “implemented a ban on all rail transit goods going to Russia’s far-western exclave of Kaliningrad.” This is a rather in-your-face, egregious lie that stands out even amid ZeroHedge’s record of in-your-face and egregious lies. The only rail shipments affected are those of goods the EU has already sanctioned. All Lithuania is doing is following the same rules as the rest of Europe.

Kaliningrad generates 100% of its own power and has access to Russia’s gas pipeline to Europe. The sanctions don’t affect food, medicine, or medical supplies. But it does stop shipments of vodka. So the health and safety of Kaliningrad’s residents aren’t at risk, but it has become a lot less fun to live there. In addition, it will directly impact the ability of Russia’s Baltic Fleet to operate until Russia can set up a sea line of communication with enough ships to keep the place running.

ZeroHedge also claims this action “marks a complete break in a three decade long treaty that’s been in effect.” Again, another lie that is quickly put to rest by use of the little-known technique of reading. The treaty ZeroHedge references is below. It does not cover the sanctioned items, and it doesn’t even cover rail traffic.

Russia Lithuania Treaty on Kaliningrad by streiff on Scribd

I really hope these people are getting paid a lot of money for propagandizing for Putin. It would be a shame if they were beclowning themselves for free.

Vladimir Putin is, in his own words, on a mission to return to Russian control lands he thinks are rightfully Russia’s, regardless of what the citizens of the targeted nations wish. A week ago, in a speech commemorating the 350th birthday of Czar Peter the Great, he specifically likened his war in Ukraine and potential future wars against neighbors to the Great Northern War (1700-1721).

“Peter the Great waged the Great Northern War for 21 years,” Putin said after visiting an exhibit in Peter’s honor. “It would seem that he was at war with Sweden, he took something from them. He did not take anything from them, he returned [what was Russia’s].”

The Russian president then alluded to the ongoing “special operation” in Ukraine, which he and his state’s propaganda arms have also cast as war of restoration and return — no matter that the sovereignty-violating invasion marks a grievous breach of international law and has led to many billions of dollars in damage to Ukraine’s towns and cities, the deaths of thousands of people and disruptions to the global economy that imperil millions more.

“What was [Peter] doing?” Putin said. “Taking back and reinforcing. That’s what he did. And it looks like it fell on us to take back and reinforce as well.”

Lithuania is one of those territories Putin wants to return to Russian control. That’s why they are paying attention.

Despite what the Putin fluffers and panty-wetters mewling that this is potentially the beginning of World War III,

it isn’t. Russia isn’t going to war over drunken and AIDS-riddled Russians in Kaliningrad not getting their vodka. The lessons Russia is learning from this criminal misadventure they are perpetrating, though, may prevent a larger war in the future.